Jyoti Mishra's website

Nilsson, Jonathan Richman, Daniel Johnston

I got a copy of ‘Nilsson Sings Newman’ from Amazon.co.uk today for the nice price of 8.99. What makes it even nicer is that it’s remastered and you also get the Harry album on the same CD. There’s also a couple of bonus tracks, ‘Waiting’ (from the film ‘Jenny’) and ‘Snow.’ I think this as an essential CD if you’re a Nilsson fan or just if you want a cheap intro to his work.

I also got ‘Home Of The Hits – The Best of Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers.’ It’s a lovely comp of Jonathan’s Beserkley output with detailed liner notes by none other than Mark Radcliffe. His notes tell the standard Jonathan story (VU fixation,Kim Fowley, Warner’s shitting out) but with a twist of love inspired by the brilliant, simple songs. You also ge a bonus CD of Beserkly notables like Greg Kihn, Rubinoos and Tyla Gang for the very reasonable sum of 8.99. Again, if you’ve not got any Richman, this is a great intro. And I’d also recommend Cooking Vinyl’s ‘I Must Be King’, but be careful cos there is some duplication of tracks between the two comps.

And now onto Daniel Johnston’s ‘Why Me?’, which is a live recording made at the Volksbuhne in Berlin on 6/6/99, released on Trikont. I have mixed feelings about this CD. On the one hand, it’s a great record with Daniel singing beatiful songs like ‘Everlasting Love’, ‘Like A Dream’ and ‘I Hate Myself.’ But Daniel’s obviously not a well man and I do wonder if I’m just being voyeuristic on someone else’s sadness. Make your own mind up – I can’t help but love the songs as much as I loved ‘Yip Jump Music’ when I first heard it. Phew, I’m pooped. I’m still listening to ’69 Love Songs’ as I’m typing all this, now with that smug ‘gonna-be-seeing-them-live-soon’ grin…